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<blockquote data-quote="Manbearcat" data-source="post: 8921522" data-attributes="member: 6696971">An easy way to examine this is as follows:* Every one of those games I mentioned above has both an individual decision-space that can be gamed more or less skillfully (managing the imagined space to optimize the availability of your possible suite of moves and then capitalizing on that by making the best move possible and then resolving it with maximum skill in terms of marshalling dice/resources) and a longitudinal decision-space that can be gamed more or less skillfully over the evolving gamestate and accruing fiction.* However, the likelihood is extreme that play in these above games will ring ultimately hollow in the actual experience of the play if your mental overhead and cognitive horsepower is invested exclusively in that endeavor.&nbsp; This is because both discovery (of &quot;self&quot; as in &quot;the character&quot; and outwardly as in &quot;this place I'm inhabiting and these others I'm inhabiting it with&quot; and &quot;the meaning behind and purpose of this inhabitation&quot;) + premise prioritization + thematic needle-threading (as I've called it in the past) are essential to (if not the nexus of) the experience. Only very, very conscientious and rigorous design will allow for these things to &quot;play nicely together.&quot;&nbsp; The alternative is a mess of incoherent incentive structures, a GM using Force to mask the reality that they're the one who is ultimately moving the gamestate and (nearly if not wholly) unilaterally deciding upon the consequential aspects of the shared fiction, and players who are relegated to affectation, pantomime, and cosplay (providing color for the GM's game of Solitaire or Ouija).So yes, you can play a game where optimising the problem-solution space is the exclusive crux or pivot point of play.&nbsp; We've got games for that (like B/X D&amp;D).&nbsp; It just so happens that if that is your crux then (a) you better design very deftly for it (and relentlessly give expression to it in the game engine and honor the integrity of the competitive exercise at every moment of play) while (b) being wary of smuggling in play priorities that may not play so nicely with that relentless expression of &quot;game as game&quot; and competitive-integrity-honoring.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Manbearcat, post: 8921522, member: 6696971"] An easy way to examine this is as follows: * Every one of those games I mentioned above has both an individual decision-space that can be gamed more or less skillfully (managing the imagined space to optimize the availability of your possible suite of moves and then capitalizing on that by making the best move possible and then resolving it with maximum skill in terms of marshalling dice/resources) and a longitudinal decision-space that can be gamed more or less skillfully over the evolving gamestate and accruing fiction. * However, the likelihood is extreme that play in these above games will ring ultimately hollow [I]in the actual experience of the play[/I] if your mental overhead and cognitive horsepower is invested exclusively in that endeavor. This is because both discovery (of "self" as in "the character" and outwardly as in "this place I'm inhabiting and these others I'm inhabiting it with" and "the meaning behind and purpose of this inhabitation") + premise prioritization + thematic needle-threading (as I've called it in the past) are essential to (if not the nexus of) the experience. Only very, very conscientious and rigorous design will allow for these things to "play nicely together." The alternative is a mess of incoherent incentive structures, a GM using Force to mask the reality that they're the one who is ultimately moving the gamestate and (nearly if not wholly) unilaterally deciding upon the consequential aspects of the shared fiction, and players who are relegated to affectation, pantomime, and cosplay (providing color for the GM's game of Solitaire or Ouija). So yes, you can play a game where [I]optimising the problem-solution space [/I]is the exclusive crux or pivot point of play. We've got games for that (like B/X D&D). It just so happens that if that is your crux then (a) you better design very deftly for it (and relentlessly [I]give expression to it in the game engine[/I] and [I]honor the integrity of the competitive exercise [/I]at every moment of play) while (b) being wary of smuggling in play priorities that may not play so nicely with that relentless expression of "game as game" and competitive-integrity-honoring. [/QUOTE]

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